By Benito Mussolini
Your Excellencies! Comrades! Gentlemen!
This first quinquennial assembly of the Regime is a new and unprecedented event in the history of Italy and the world. It is quinquennial because it will be held every five years, so that the next will take place in 1934, in the twelfth year of the Fascist Era. It is an assembly because it brings together all the vital and productive forces of national society, all the men who carry out specific responsibilities and functions at the top of the hierarchies and converge on a sole objective.
The fact that this assembly has been duly convened on the eve of a plebiscitary election must not be misleading. This is not an electoral assembly. Rather it is the Great Report of the Major State of the Nation.
My speech will be extremely synthetic and will and will not contain anything remotely new to you, being as you are the protagonists of the story.
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The new electoral law, which is the logical and legitimate consequence of the profound constitutional transformation of the State and the creation of new corporative institutions, has worked excellently. The new Chamber is formed via a two-stage process of selection and its ratification by the people, and this people is distinct in terms of its capacity. All forces have had the opportunity to be represented, even those that—in the period of conflicting parties—used to be routinely ignored. Gone for good is the depressing succession of deceptions, frauds, and acts of violence which inevitably accompanied the so-called electoral campaigns of the past. These elections have been abolished: people now vote for an idea, for a Regime, not for men.
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Behold: I have before my spirit our Italy in its geography, its history, its people: the sea, mountains, rivers, cities, countryside, people. Let's begin with the sea. The sea was neglected: the Regime has brought the Italians back to it. The merchant navy was in decay: the Regime has revived it. During these years we have placed colossal and powerful ships into the sea. The ports were impoverished: the Regime has equipped them and created free zones. The labour there was discontinuous due to all the strikes: now the discipline of the workforce is perfect. Each year the Regime sends hundreds of thousands of sons of the people to the sea, which is a source of health and life. The Italian passion for the sea now flourishes once again. It is recognized as an element of national power.
Moving away from the subject of the eternally moving sea, let's now focus on the mountains that protect our greatest plain and form the backbone of our peninsula. An environmental policy is already underway. Italy will be covered with trees, which the Forestry Militia will plant and protect. Two parks, one in the heart of the Alps and another in the heart of the Apennines, will rescue and preserve our surviving wildlife. The policy of the Regime is directed at maintaining the population of the mountains, for both peaceful and military purposes.
Between the sea and the mountains, there are valleys and plains: our land is very beautiful, but very cramped: only 30 million hectares for 42 million men. This requires an absolutely imperative response: we must ensure that every inch of soil is being used to its maximum fertility. Fascism fully asserts its rural character. Hence the rural policy of the Regime in all its various aspects: agricultural credit, land reclamation, the moral and political exaltation of the people of the fields and villages. Only with the advent of Fascism have the peasant-farmers entered the history of the Fatherland in its own right. Turn your eyes upon the Ager Romanus and you will witness the profound agricultural transformation that is taking place as we speak.
The Regime has left traces of its activity in all the cities of Italy. Some of them were elevated to the dignity of provincial capitals. All of them were given funds for construction, sanitation, education and administration. Rome, for obvious reasons, had a special arrangement.
A nation exists only insofar as it is a people. A people rises only insofar as it has a healthy birth rate, is industrious, and is disciplined. Power is the product of these three basic factors. We need to start applying them at the beginning of each life. This is the function of a newly created organization which typifies the Regime: the National Organization for the Protection of Motherhood and Infancy. In 1928, ₤79 million was used for this purpose.
Our future generations must have schools. Thousands of school buildings have been built: a massive amount of aid has been given to many Universities. The Regime also implemented an educational reform that has given way to a new style of teaching, restoring the necessary discipline and dignity that schools had lost... Public education has made a tremendous rush forward: elementary schools have grown in number... The National Research Council and the Royal Academy of Italy are the leading institutes of Italian culture.
The whole educational system in Italy is imbued by the spirit of the victorious war and of the Fascist revolution. Alongside the schools, and complementing them, the youth is organized into the Balilla and Avangaurdisti, the hope and pride of the Fatherland.
The working people are integrated within the institutions of the Regime: syndicalism and corporativism enable the whole Nation to be organized. The system is based on the legal recognition of professional unions, on collective contracts, on the prohibition of strikes and lock-outs, on the Charter of Labour (a fundamental document, the importance of whose provisions will come to be appreciated more and more), and on the Magistrature of Labour, which has already borne fruit. Labour and capital have ceased to consider their antagonisms as an inexorable fact of history: the conflicts which inevitably arise are solved peacefully thanks to an increasing degree of conscious class collaboration. Hundreds of national pacts involving millions of workers have been entered into. The social legislation of Fascist Italy is the most advanced in the world: it ranges from the law on the eight-hour day, to compulsory insurance against tuberculosis.
The classes of employers are also at the forefront. The Italian manufacturers especially have rid themselves of their old classist mentality, and just as the discipline of the working masses is absolute, so the sense of responsibility to the community and of human solidarity among the Italian industrial classes constitutes one of their claims to honour.
The formidable Italian experiment, which is summed up in the phrase "Lawful organization of all the forces contributing to production", is the subject of international study and is already being looked upon as a model by several countries around the world which are still suffering from the divisions and conflicts of class struggle. What we have established is neither State Socialism nor any other kind of socialism, as some ignorant eavesdroppers have claimed. The Regime respects and defends private property; we recognize and acknowledge private initiative, and we refuse to engage in those socialist experiments that have turned into a disaster everywhere else they have been tried. However, neither does our policy have anything to do with unregulated capitalism, which is indifferent to the interests of others, and whose impact—if it is not contained—can endanger the health and the very life of the Nation.
In modern countries, with dense populations, the communication system is essential, not only for trade, but for spirit. Communications in Italy have in the last few years made impressive progress: new railway sections, electrification of lines, increase of telegraph lines, ultra-modern refinement of the telephone, highways, ordinary roads under repair and accommodation.
The same leap forward has been made in the field of public works. I take this opportunity to remind you of the formidable balance of public works announced and inaugurated every October 28. During the last fifty years before the Fascist Regime, southern Italy and the islands have never had anything but "electoral" public works, that is, public works promised to the people before the elections, but not carried out afterwards. However, in the last few years things have radically changed. Work is now progressing with the improvement of the ports of Naples, Palermo, Catania, Bari and Brindisi; important work has already been carried out in Calabria, and many improvements effected in Sardinia. In the coming years the efforts of the Regime will be directed more systematically towards southern Italy and the Islands.
The moral difficulty of the past is over. For the Regime, north and south do not exist: there exists only Italy and the Italian people.
Besides the arrangement of these things, it was also necessary to arrange the spirit and to utilize the forces that had created the Regime. Therefore, squadrismo became the Militia and every trace of squadrismo disappeared. The Militia assumed, with time, more and more defined aspects and more various and important tasks.
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The National Fascist Party thus assumed its increasingly precise characteristic as an organ of the State subordinated to the hierarchy, faithful and obedient to the needs of the State.
People need security and justice. The new law, or better yet the new Code of Public Security, substituting and complementing the old law, gives the State a very valuable tool to protect good law-abiding citizens from violence or from perversion by wicked men. The administration of justice has enacted significant innovations, ranging from the unification of cassations, to the imminent reform of the Codes. The fact that the the first place in the hierarchical ordering of the State—a fundamental law of the Regime—belongs to the President of the Supreme Court of Cassation of the Kingdom, demonstrates that justice is the foundation of the Regime.
Besides the ordinary judiciary, there is the Special Tribunal for the Defense of the State whose task is to suppress any criminal activity against the Regime. Despite the fairy tales constantly peddled by international anti-Fascism, this Tribunal has been stern but fair. Incontrovertible figures prove this: out of 5,046 accused, more than 4,000 were acquitted. As for the rest, 275 were sentenced to less than ten years; only one was sentenced to death; and 230 will be released later this year. Compared to ancient and contemporary terrors, the Fascists almost seem soft. In any case, the Regime is willing not to extend these laws for the defense of the State. We are even willing to abolish them altogether, provided that the surviving remnants of anti-Fascism will resign themselves to the irrevocable fait accompli, and cease their absurd attempts to undermine us with their ridiculous misrepresentations and catastrophic literature, which is a grotesque mixture of propaganda and bad faith.
Not only is it necessary for the people to be orderly and tranquil on the inside, it is also necessary that the Armed Forces afford them their peace and security. In this field also the Regime has left deep traces: a new law has created the Supreme Commission of Defense; another law has established the organization of the Nation during war; the law of 1925 gave new order to the Army; the laws of 1926 and 1927 provided a new statute, while in 1928 rules were adopted for the use and action of larger units. The morale and discipline of the Italian troops are as high as in any other country in the world.
The soldiers, after completing their pre-military duties, go to the barracks singing "Giovinezza". [...] The old, glorious military schools of Modena and Turin have resumed their noble educational and training mission.
In addition to the Army, the Regime has made a considerable effort to improve the Navy. We must remember that during peacetime, the Navy is the element that establishes the hierarchy between States. The Air Force was created from the ruins it had been left in.
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To conclude on this point, remember that Fascism has exalted our victory [in the Great War] and has caused it to animate the spirit of the Armed Forces and the Italian people. For this reason, the Regime has met with war veterans, and organized them into the National Association of Combattents (ANC) and the National Association of Mutilated and Disabled Veterans (ANMIG), as well as the National Association of Families of War Dead (ANFCDG) and the National Association for the Families of Fallen Fascists. The Pension law for mutilated and disabled veterans is a crowning achievement of the Fascist government.
The military preparedness of a Nation is a constant necessity; its development is related to financial solidity. Here too, the Regime has shown strength: the petty, dirty paper currencies have disappeared, and have been replaced by more precious metals; savings are defended; the issuance of circulation is unified; the lira has been stabilized thanks to valiant efforts... However, we are still in a period of convalescence, just like the economies of all the other European nations, even those that are much richer than us.
Efficient armed forces and sound finances are the precondition for the foreign policy of a State. My speech on June 6, 1928 to the Senate covered all this. Let's review it.
Our major plans have not changed, nor can they change, unless unforeseen events force them to.
Those who are vainly trying to frighten the world with the boogeyman of Italian imperialism, should be reminded again that Italy keeps its armament expenditures within the strictest limits of security and defense; that Italy wishes to live in peace with all nations, especially with those who are its neighbors; that Italy has concluded treaties of commerce and friendship with numerous States; and that often these agreements have dispersed clouds, cleared up intrigues, and restored confidence. Moreover, Italy is focusing on its efforts to create new institutions and a new type of civilization which shall reconcile modernity with tradition, progress with faith, the machine with the soul, and synthesize the thought and achievements of the last two centuries. Italy does not wish to disturb the peace, but is nevertheless prepared to defend her interests in all parts of the world.
All the activity of the Regime is accomplished through the administrative departments. The entire body of State employees, and in general of those who serve the government, deserve praise. They have worked conscientiously, honestly and with discipline. The condition of these men who—in the familiar but dignified phrase—are called State servants, is not brilliant.
In this simple statement you may perceive an intention to improve them. This will happen in the natural course of events, by action of the Government at the opportune moment, without solicitation or demand from the outside. How far seem the days when a handful of preposterous employees of the Italian State engaged in strikes and threatened lock-outs.
Our possessions and colonies are an extension of the power of the Fatherland. The Dodecanese henceforth is in doubt no longer, and Rhodes will become again the Latin pearl of the Orient. Somaliland is pacified and consolidated; Massawa is resurrected; our Mediterranean colonies are making progress. United under the same command, Tripoli and Bengasi are now in the minds of Italians regarded as cities of the mother country. Hundreds of pioneers are going there. The steppe is covering itself with green, punctuated by houses; while along the dunes—a sight unseen for centuries—rows of trees are rising up on the sand. Meanwhile immortal monuments of the Roman conquest, still almost completely intact, are emerging from the African sands; the genius of Rome is much more benign than the barbarians.
The Regime has concerned itself primarily with the Italians living at home; but it has given thought also to the 10 million Italians scattered around world whom the voice of the Fatherland has reached through a network of Italian telegraph lines, thus giving them a sense of pride in the unity of the Fatherland such as they never had before.
This picture of the achievements of the Regime for the State and the people is far from complete. There are other endeavors which must be remembered: the organization of sport and physical education, with stadiums and gymnasiums not unworthy in magnitude of those of ancient Rome. Our social service for the leisure of the workers after work; our various artistic enterprises, left no longer to individuals or groups, but guided by the law; the restored dignity of our great theatres; the resumption of the unearthing of ancient remains which testify to the marvelous history that is, before and after Christ, the history of Rome.
Thus far I have spoken to you of the Italian people in their manifold and eternal expression. But the Italian people have a faith; it is believing; it is Catholic. Italy has the unique privilege of harboring within its borders the center of a religion two thousand years old. It is not by mere coincidence, or human caprice, that this religion arose in Rome and radiates from Rome. The Roman Empire is the historical forerunner of early Christianity and thus of Catholicism. The language of the Church today is still the language of Caesar and Virgil.
After the long, sad centuries of division and foreign servitude, Rome was to become once again the capital of a reborn Italy, since no other city could possibly be the capital of Italy. But this necessity and the inevitable results of the first phase of the Risorgimento led to grave dissension, which has tormented the conscience of Italians since 1870. This dissension, a true thorn in the side of the Nation, has been healed by the accords of February 11.
These precise and equitable accords between Italy and the Holy See do not create a situation of confusion or hypocrisy, but of differentiation and loyalty. I think, and it does not appear to me absurd, that only under the Regime of the Concordat can the logical, normal, beneficial separation between Church and State be realized. Permit me to clarify: I am speaking of the distinction between the tasks and the attributes of the one and the other. Each has its own rights, its own duties, its own powers within its own confines. Only with this premise—in such spheres—is it possible to practice a collaboration between the sovereign State and the sovereign Church.
To speak of victors and vanquished is childish; we speak of absolute equity of accord, which mutually heals de jure a definite but always perilous and commonly painful situation. Agreement is always better than strife; the good neighbour must always be preferred to war.
The peace between the Quirinal and the Vatican is an event of supreme importance, not only for Italy, but also for the world. For Italians it is enough to remember that February 11, 1929, saw the Supreme Pontiff finally and solemnly recognize the Kingdom of Italy under the House of Savoy with Rome as the capital of the Italian State.
On our part we have loyally recognized the sovereignty of the Holy See, not only because it was in fact in existence, not only for the small extent of territory required, a requirement that takes away nothing of its grandeur of another nature, but through the conviction that the Supreme Head of a universal religion cannot be the subject of any State without injury to Catholicity, which signifies universality.
We have recognized the pre-eminent place the Catholic Church holds in the religious life of the Italian people, which is perfectly natural in a Catholic people such as ours, and under a regime such as the Fascist Regime. Here too, the Regime is logical and consistent. This does not imply, as it is superfluous to say, that the other cults hitherto tolerated must be henceforth persecuted, suppressed or simply harassed. A Catholic State does not signify that citizens must be pressed and forced to follow a determined faith, even when it is the faith of the majority. But with the delimitation of jurisdictions, of obligations, of responsibilities between State and State, and State and Church, the path appears clearer, the horizon more serene. A milestone has been placed at the end of fifteen centuries of history.
Thus here is made concrete in law a line of conduct that follows from the events of 1923 and after. The Fascist State is not required to maintain, as certain scattered Demo-Masonic cellular survivals pretend, all the measures of legislation that was produced during a particular historical period of bitter tension between Church and State, not to mention that such laws, with the passage of time, and in face of agnostic indulgence and the final disappearance of Liberalism, have become merely simple fictions. Events such as those of February 11 are of such importance that in order to judge them, we must place them in relation to the whole history. The intuitive soul of the multitude is in these cases—far more than the reasoning intelligence—nearest to the truth! The soul of the people has felt in the solution of the delicate and troublesome Roman Question a title of pride and a documentation of the force and solidity of the Fascist Regime.
Gentlemen! Do not believe that I wish to make myself guilty of the sin of immodesty when I say that all this work—of which I have given you but a very condensed synopsis—has been accomplished under my sole inspiration. The labour of legislation, of organization, of supervision and of creation in the new institutions, has been only a part of my work. There is another work, not so well known, but whose extent may be measured by these figures which may perhaps interest you: I have given 60,000 audiences, I have given attention to 1,887,112 citizens' cases which came directly to my private office. Every time that citizens, even those from distant villages, addressed themselves to me, they received an answer. It is not enough to govern with firmness; it is necessary that the people, even those who are far away, humble and forgotten, should have it proved to them that the government is composed of men who understand them, who care about them, and who do not deem themselves better than the rest of mankind. In order to carry out this effort I have placed my body under strict training; I have systematized my daily work; I have reduced to a minimum any waste of time and energy; and I have adopted this maxim, which I recommend to all Italians: Each day's work must be methodically and regularly completed in the course of the day. No work should be left to pile up. Ordinary work must be carried out with an almost mechanical automatic precision.
As you are doubtless aware, now that I am approaching the end, my speech has been, as I told you, merely an outline. I have not said all I could have said. I have also forgotten many things, but how could I explain the two thousand laws in which, for the last six years, the theory, the will and the faith of the Fascist State has been realized? My speech would taken weeks to complete. Has the work been perfect? No. Like all human efforts, even mine, our work has gaps and imperfections; but the determination to keep faith in the Fascist idea of the State has inspired every act and every law.
One incontestable merit of Fascism has been to give Italians a sense of the State. Everything which we have done and which I have summarized for you must recede into the background before our creative work for the State. For Fascism the State is not merely a night watchman which only looks after the personal safety of the citizens. Nor is it a purely material organization seeking to guarantee a certain well-being and a relatively peaceful social life to the community. An administrative council could do that much. Nor is it a purely political mechanism, unrelated to reality and the daily life of individuals and of nations. The State, as Fascism conceives and practices it, is a spiritual and moral fact; for through it the political, legal and economic organization of the Nation is rendered concrete. And this organization is in its origin and development a manifestation of the spirit. It is the duty of the State to provide internal and external security; but the State is also the custodian and transmitter of the spirit of the people as it has been fashioned throughout the centuries in language, in customs and in faith.
The State is not only present; it is also past; and above all, it is future. It is the State which, transcending the brief span of individual life, represents the immanent consciousness of the Nation. It is the State which, in Italy, is embodied and exalted in the House of Savoy and the Sacred and August person of the King.
The forms in which States express themselves change, but the necessity for the State remains. It is the State which rears the citizen to civic virtue; makes him conscious of a mission; moves a people to unity, and harmonizes its interests in justice; passes on the achievements of thought, science, art, law, and human solidarity; carries men up from the primitive tribal stage to the highest expression of human power which is the Empire; passes on to the centuries the names of those who die for its unity and in obedience to its laws; commends to future generations and raises up as examples those leaders who have added to its territory and those men of genius who have made it lustrous with glory.
When the sense of the State declines and when individuals and groups allow disintegrating tendencies to prevail, the Nation enters into its twilight period. After this review of our past, and with this our doctrinal principles to which we shall remain faithful, can you doubt the future? No; and neither can the Italian people to whom you will convey the message of this grand assembly.
When we meet again in Rome, five years from now, my next account of the achievements of the Regime will be even more glorious than those of today. It is with this certainty before you, that you and the people will vote 'Yes'. That brief monosyllable will show the world that Italy is Fascism and that Fascism is Italy.
